Tag Archives | vaccines

The effect that blaming autism on vaccines has on actual autistic children

By on September 17, 2015 in Autism
Trump calls autism an epidemic as the result of vaccines

Trump calls autism an epidemic as the result of vaccines

So now we’re back to the whole anti-vaccine thing thanks to Donald Trump’s comments during the republican debates. Despite overwhelming scientific studies that have proven that there is absolutely no link between vaccines and autism, we continue to have people like Mr. Trump who prey on the fears of parents. I thought I’d take this time to explain to you what I see from the children that come to me asking if it’s true.

Most of the time, not always but a good 90% of the time, when a child asks me about vaccines and autism, they do so from a very personal place. Now granted, those other 10% of kids have a scientific curiosity and you can tell that they are genuinely just curious but for the rest, for all those other kids that I talk to, they’re worried and they’re scared. They feel like a mistake, an abomination and a victim.

I’ve talked to a lot of anti-vaccination parents and I know it’s not their intention and I know they love their children as much as any other parent but to be perfectly honest, that has absolutely nothing to do with anything. Intentions or not, this is about how a child feels when they are told that they are a damaged product of a broken system that their parent didn’t want. Harsh? Maybe but this is the message that the child is receiving.

You don’t understand the damage you are doing to your own child with this nonsense. You really don’t. Your child will never tell you this because they are scared to death that you hate them and what they are… a broken version of the kid that you actually wanted. You are damaging your own child even worse than what you think those vaccines are doing. Your children are reaching out to total strangers on the Internet in search for answers because they are convinced that they are not the child you wanted. They are convinced that they are the source of your anger and your rage and your disappointment.

And you will disagree me and you will tell me that it’s not your child that I’m talking about but I’m telling you right now, and please listen to me… you clearly don’t see the impact. I am talking to these children every day and it’s breaking my heart. No one can convince them that they’re not a mistake and no one can make them believe that their parents love them when they grow up feeling like they are the foundation of your hate. And these children won’t let their parents know this. They don’t want to hurt their parents any more than what they think they’ve already done.

Please. Please! My heart is breaking for these poor children. They can’t take this. No child should be feeling this way! You can’t do this to them. You just can’t. I beg of you. I’m not asking you to stop believing what you believe. I don’t know, maybe I am. All I’m asking is… please stop doing this to your own children. To all of these children. To every child everywhere that is scared to death that they’re a broken, disappointing autistic byproduct of being poisoned.

Please don’t do this to them anymore.

  • I am Stuart Duncan, owner of Autcraft, a world wide Minecraft server with a user base of 6000 children that have autism. I speak to many of these children almost daily about some of the most personal aspects of their lives. I will not be sharing names or direct quotes as I do not want any of those children to feel like I am singling them out or giving clues as to their identity.
Comments { 15 }

This is the scariest part about the CDC Whistleblower story by far

By on August 28, 2014 in Autism
CDC

CDC

As I watched the news unfold on August 22, 2014 about a CDC “whistle blower” coming forth to speak out about the CDC concealing results from the general public about any potential links between autism and the MMR vaccine, I couldn’t help but notice some very disturbing trends.

  • Panic – This is pretty normal. Having been in the autism community for a few years now, I see this every single time anyone says the “V” word. But this time it was on an unprecedented scale the likes of which haven’t been seen since 1998.
  • Confusion – People throw their hands in the air proclaiming all that they know was wrong and they no longer know what to believe. Who to believe? What to do?
  • Paranoia – “The CDC is intentionally harming our children” is just one of the statements I’ve seen. Many of the others that I’ve seen are similar.
  • Anger – What is the response for people who believe it? Anger. What is the response for people who don’t? Anger. And so the fighting begins.

All this aside, people took to Twitter (other social media sites as well but the worst I saw was on Twitter) and began a long and relentless stream of #CDCWhistleblower tweets. Days later, it was still picking up steam as celebrities such as Rob Schneider and Donald Trump got in on it.


What scared me most though, above all else, was watching all of these people demand that CNN and other media agencies answer immediately. That the very day that this came out, the very day that anyone became aware of it, people were outraged that the mainstream media was “ignoring” this story.

This defines the autism-vaccine movement in my eyes. This is why and very much how it’s gotten to this point.

People, in their fear and their panic and their confusion have decided that waiting for a proper investigation, fact checking, source checking or anything that looked like thinking about it… was a waste of time. People immediately came to the conclusion that the mainstream media was covering this up because it didn’t show up on the 6 o’clock news that evening.

And this really sums up the anti-vaccine in a nutshell. The raw emotion that bubbles up through the mixture of fear, hate, panic and confusion has no time for facts or verification. People want immediate answers and they don’t care where those answers come from.

Now, I know, you may be reading that and are getting upset but honestly, truthfully consider this. If you really do want the truth, please just consider these few points:

  • The video comes from Andrew Wakefield, the guy who’s whole career was destroyed due to his false claims. Of course he wants to salvage that.
  • The “study” is based on a smaller, hand picked bunch of numbers from a larger study that already had it’s own margin of error.

To break down the study, let’s consider this… if you take all the people in the US and figure out how many people are born with Albinism (albino), it’s about 1 in 17,000. But if I wanted to, I could figure out whether it’s more common in men or women and then pick that one. More common in one state than the rest and pick that one. More common in people of a certain age group and pick that one. More common when parents drink coffee or not and pick that one. More common when the baby is born on a certain day of the week and pick that one.

What I’m getting at is, to a researcher, given enough time and effort, you can take any study and work the numbers until eventually you have 1 in 6 people being albino.

If the people that pay you to work those numbers happen to have an invested interest in making sure that those numbers say that??? Well, then you take that a whole other level higher.

And for the record, the doctor that did the study, Dr. Hooker, was just such a doctor that had an invested interest in proving vaccines caused autism. More so, he was funded by Focus Autism, who by the way, have a huge investment in making those numbers tell their own story.

Once they did, who told that story? Andrew Wakefield. The guy with his own vaccine patents.

But back to my original point, no one wanted to hear any of this. No one wanted it checked, or verified or questioned or investigated or… well, anything. They wanted none of that because that took time and they wanted answers that day. That, to me, is scary as hell. That’s a huge disappointment to me. I really thought that people would want better. I really thought that people would want real answers, not fast “what I want to hear” answers.

If you aren’t one of those “just tell me what I want to be told” types of people and actually do want the real truth, please please please stop and consider the sources, the facts, the time it takes to be absolutely certain and please, don’t just believe the first thing you hear. If it’s the first thing you hear, chances are no one took the time to check to see if it’s true. Please read the below links as they take the time to explain all that I’ve said here and more in very in depth detail and accuracy.

If you truly want the truth, you owe it to yourself to give it the time it deserves.

As do your children, who by the way, hold their very lives in your hands and are depending on you to understand this, not just get the quickest answer.

For more info:

Time –Whistleblower Claims CDC Covered Up Data Showing Vaccine-Autism Link

CNN –Journal questions validity of autism and vaccine study

Left Brain/Right Brain – Autism, Atlanta, MMR: serious questions and also how Brian Hooker and Andrew Wakefield are causing damage to the autism communities

IFLScience – No, The CDC Is Not Covering Up Evidence That Vaccines Cause Autism

Whistle Blower’s Statement – Statement of William W. Thompson

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So it’s Victim Mom vs Warrior Mom now? Here is some perspective

By on June 21, 2012 in Autism

 

Jenny Mccarthy Victim

Sending all the wrong messages

Jenny McCarthy, more famous in the autism community for her on again/off again autistic son and her war on vaccines than her actual acting career, has made some very bold statements during the latest Autism One conference where she likened some moms to choosing to be victims and enjoying the “oh woe is me” victim role.

For some light reading on the subject:

Jenny McCarthy: Autism Moms “Fall in the the victim role…and they are loving it”
Words Matter
A letter to @JennyMcCarthy

There are a lot more posts and articles out there but I don’t want to list every single blog/article in the autism community because everyone has written about this.

I was going to let this go by as just something silly, nonsensical or, more or less, stupid.

But, upon thinking about it more today, I’ve come to the conclusion that I should say something. Something that I feel is imortant.

Perspective

To recount what it was that she said, I’m going to borrow from the Left Brain/Right Brain post (the first article I listed above):

As we continued to talk about alternative treatments for our children, I noticed the room separating into two sides. We were no longer talking as a whole anymore. There was a group of moms who didn’t want anything to do with what we were talking about. They slumped into a corner and had a “woe is me” attitude. I decided to eavesdrop on both conversations.

The “woe is me” moms were talking about how they didn’t get to shop or go to the beach with their friends anymore, and the “I’ll try anything if it will help my kid recover” moms were trading success stories about the latest treatments.

And, later…

“My other theory was that they enjoyed the victim role. I know that might sound mean, but I’m sure you’ve met people who are constantly having shit go wrong in their life. They complain and play the “don’t you feel sorry for me” game.

Now, for the most part, the autism community got up in arms over this in one of two ways… either being offended as she had called them victims, or defending her as they felt that she was making a great point.

My stance is, it’s all a matter of perspective. Now, hear me out.

This is just an example, but where’s the dads? How come it’s only moms who get a label? If anyone should be offended, it’s us dads that work every bit as hard as the victims and warriors combined and we’re forgotten about completely.

See? Perspective.

Anyway, more to the point, I’d like to offer a few alternative perspectives.

The two groups

The two groups that she alludes to were contained within one larger group of moms discussing alternative treatments. I can only assume, and this is just me, that if not all, then most of those moms were in the anti-vaccine camp… believing that vaccines, or other toxins, had caused their child’s autism in the first place.

This already excludes a lot of moms in the autism community. The majority I’d say, since most autism moms do not believe the vaccine theory. This means that she’s casting a divide within an already divided group.

So to put it mathematically, in hypothesis only and my numbers will be way off, if the split is 75/25 for moms who don’t believe the vaccine theory and those who do… then she’s dividing up the 25 into two groups. If 50/50 then it would be 13/12 or something like that.

It’s still very wrong to label those moms and cast judgement, I’m just saying that maybe she’s not talking about the moms that you think she’s talking about. You know, the moms that have no qualms with the toxins of the world.

The Accepting Mom

The prevalent perspective is that Ms. McCarthy is talking about moms that have come to accept their child as they are.. with or without autism. That those moms do not seek out chelation or force feed their children bleach and therefore would rather just be the victim.

If this is the perspective of choice, then you must realize that it’s how she sees things. It’s her own perspective.

I realize that this won’t be popular among those who like Jenny McCarthy or feel how she feels but remember, this is only to illustrate a different perspective.

See, she may consider a mom that does not try things like giving their child a bleach enema as just playing the victim but I tend to think of that mom as simply having common sense enough to not try something obviously dangerous, and stupid.

She may consider a mom that accepts their child for who they are as enjoying the victim role so much that they give up rather than try tons of pointless and costly treatments but I tend to think that not seeing their children as damaged goods in the first place, and having unconditional love trumps all titles that one can fling at them.

She may consider a mom that talks about her struggles in raising a child with autism as a person that basks in the feeling of being the helpless victim but I tend to see that mom as someone that I can relate to, get advice from, share experiences with and understand.

She may see a “warrior mom” as a woman that battles “big pharma” and government agencies. That’s fine. To me, when I see a mom crying about how the evil empires broke their child, how much money they spend on treatments that put their children in danger because they are so desperate to cure them… that’s when I see a victim. In fact, I hear it in their chants: “big pharma is making money while making our children sick. We’re the victims!”

She may see a mother that never stops fighting for their child as a warrior mom but I tend to think that ALL MOTHERS NEVER STOP FIGHTING FOR THEIR CHILD. If they do… they’re not really their mother. Moms do not give up. Period.

She may see compassion, positivity, acceptance, understanding and love as being the victim. Then I say, please call me a victim too.

If seeing my child as perfect makes me a victim and seeing my child as broken, in need of being cured from the damage done by evil doctors makes me a warrior… I’ll take the victim title, thank you.

That’s just my perspective. And opinions are born out of perspectives. They do not make them fact.

Her opinions, based on her perspective, should remain her own.

She’s entitled to them.

As I am entitled to mine.

Signed,

Victim and proud.

Comments { 17 }

Parents are now forcing their children a bleach enema to “cure” their autism

By on May 31, 2012 in Autism

In a mystifying case of “What the hell is going on?!?!?”, some parents are now taking to bleach as a cure… forcing their children to have a bleach enema to clean the autism out of their system.

I’m not the best at getting into the nitty gritty details and besides, these two sources handle it far better than I can. So if you have the stomach for it, check out these links and read about MMS or “Miracle Mineral Solution”:

Bleaching away what ails you
MMS, or how to cure autism with bleach. Brought to you by AutismOne

Please be sure you read those, or at least, some of those articles, before proceeding.

bleachSo very wrong

How in the world can a person go from “trace amounts of toxins in vaccines, too small to see, are harming our children” to “here honey, let’s put this stuff in you that CAN KILL YOU!”?

I just can’t fathom this way of thinking. I mean, how desperate can a person be to forcefully make their child sick? I mean, there’s a good risk of outright killing the child and yet this is somehow worth curing autism?

How badly must a person hate their child that they force them to drink bleach?

Please please please PLEASE don’t ever have bleach anywhere near your child! It doesn’t matter who tells you try it… just don’t!

Abuse is abuse

A recent news article surfaced in which two people kept their two children in a caged room, without clothing or anything, for up to 16 hours a day.. and they were charged for it. They were found not guilty in the end, but a LOT of people felt that it was abuse.

There are many more cases like this, such as a school that placed a boy in a box for several hours because he was pacing and not listening to his teacher.

People scream “This is cruelty!! This is abuse!!”

Then, some of these people turn around and give their child a bleach enema??

I just don’t get it because to me, forcing this bleach thing is far worse than putting them in a cage. It’s much more a form of abuse since it does them physical harm (not to diminish the effects of psychological harm done by imprisonment).

I just don’t get it

Anyway, I just don’t get how a parent can get mad at doctors for putting harmful substances into their child and then put something so very obviously dangerous into their child themselves.

I also don’t get how a parent can hate the hurtful things that others do to their children and then turn around and force bleach into their child, something that can kill them.

I also don’t get how this is legal. I don’t get how these people aren’t being arrested for this. Is it because a doctor told them to do it? Does that make it ok?

Because I don’t think it does. I don’t think it matters who tells you to do it, putting bleach into a child is wrong.

If I saw a parent doing that to their child, I’d call child services on them immediately and demand that the child be removed from their care.

I’d also be phoning the police.

I don’t care what doctor told them it’s ok to do it.

That’s just how I am.

I just don’t get it.

Comments { 8 }

Autism Study of the Month: Ancestors that had mercury poisoning increases risk of Autism

By on August 9, 2011 in Autism Study of the Month

Mercury

Ancestry of Pink Disease (Infantile Acrodynia) Identified as a Risk Factor for Autism Spectrum Disorders

Source – http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15287394.2011.590097?journalCode=uteh20

Abstract

Pink disease (infantile acrodynia) was especially prevalent in the first half of the 20th century. Primarily attributed to exposure to mercury (Hg) commonly found in teething powders, the condition was developed by approximately 1 in 500 exposed children. The differential risk factor was identified as an idiosyncratic sensitivity to Hg. Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have also been postulated to be produced by Hg. Analogous to the pink disease experience, Hg exposure is widespread yet only a fraction of exposed children develop an ASD, suggesting sensitivity to Hg may also be present in children with an ASD. The objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that individuals with a known hypersensitivity to Hg (pink disease survivors) may be more likely to have descendants with an ASD. Five hundred and twenty-two participants who had previously been diagnosed with pink disease completed a survey on the health outcomes of their descendants. The prevalence rates of ASD and a variety of other clinical conditions diagnosed in childhood (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, epilepsy, Fragile X syndrome, and Down syndrome) were compared to well-established general population prevalence rates. The results showed the prevalence rate of ASD among the grandchildren of pink disease survivors (1 in 25) to be significantly higher than the comparable general population prevalence rate (1 in 160). The results support the hypothesis that Hg sensitivity may be a heritable/genetic risk factor for ASD.

PR Release from Source

You can read here: http://www.swinburne.edu.au/chancellery/mediacentre/media-centre/news/2011/08/australian-research-finds-autism-risk-

Translation

Essentially what they are saying is that they found 522 people that were diagnosed with “Pink Desease” or mercury poisoning a long time ago and then checked out their grandchildren.

What they found was that 1 in 25 of those children were on the Autism Spectrum… which is a mighty big leap from the 1 in 160 children currently estimated in Australia.

The idea is that those 522 people must have had a greater weakness to mercury to be poisoned by it when other children were not… which, genetically, could mean that their children and even grandchildren would also have a greater weakness to it.

Thus, being exposed to it in seafood, dental fillings or preservatives in some vaccines may trigger a response in those children, including Autism.

My Opinion

This is simply my opinion of the story, stop reading if you do not want opinions and are happy just having read the details of the original study itself.

1. Aside from mercury poisoning symptoms having nothing in common with Autism symptoms, one would have to wonder how many, if any, of those 522 grandparents are Autistic.

2. The study makes no mention of verifying any of the original 522 people’s claims of having mercury poisoning. Being so long ago, it’s entirely possible they were misdiagnosed or not diagnosed at all. There was also no mention of verifying the grandchild’s Autism diagnoses either.

3. The rates, while still higher, resemble the rates found in the Korea total population study. A comparison of a control group vs comparing numbers of children being diagnosed on a regular basis is likely to be radically different for multiple reasons, including parents not recognizing the signs in their children, inappropriate facilities/services and so on.

4. If true, this would indicate that Autism is still largely genetic and is triggered by a toxin, such as mercury. Meaning that Autism could simply be onset since birth or “awoken” by introduction of some outside toxin, such as mercury.

I’ve long held the belief that Autism is not a “one cause, one cure, one story” disorder… that the reason it eludes scientists so much is that there is no one answer.

Do I believe that this study is the answer to it all? No. But it could lead to further answers. It certainly has a better chance than some other recent stories, like this one.

I have my doubts about this one as a lot of wholes were left open in terms of verifying data, it’s collection methods and what the numbers really mean.

But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t some real validity to it’s findings.

As I find more information, more insights, I’ll continue to update this article.

 

“Autism Study of the Month”
The purpose of the Autism Study of the Month series is to provide unpolluted (by the media) information about the studies released at least once a month in the study of possible Autism causes or risks.
You will find links to the actual studies, get to read the “abstract” of the study and, when possible, get the PR release from the source.
When it comes to science, let’s leave the media out of it.

Comments { 2 }